


Torch

by shinychimera, Yeomanrand



Series: Torch Universe [1]
Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Insanity, M/M, Mirror Universe, Prequel, Violence, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2010-02-16
Updated: 2010-04-14
Packaged: 2017-10-07 07:40:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/62914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shinychimera/pseuds/shinychimera, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yeomanrand/pseuds/Yeomanrand
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The crazy!Kirk and evil!McCoy of the <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/62911"><em>Foreign Waters</em></a> stories meet at the Academy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **Authors:** [](http://shinychimera.livejournal.com/profile)[**shinychimera**](http://shinychimera.livejournal.com/) and [](http://yeomanrand.livejournal.com/profile)[**yeomanrand**](http://yeomanrand.livejournal.com/)  
> **Disclaimers:** We do not own any of these characters.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mirror!Kirk takes the _Kobayashi Maru_ test and meets Mirror!McCoy for the first time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Warnings:** This section's very mild, for the mirrorverse; some violence and swearing.   
> **Notes:** The quote is from Neil Gaiman (_Good Omens_), and some inspiration was taken from the Pocket _Star Trek_ novel #47 _The Kobayashi Maru_ by Julia Ecklar (excellent, go read it!).
> 
> Originally [posted](http://community.livejournal.com/issenterprise/25737.html) to [](http://community.livejournal.com/issenterprise/profile)[**issenterprise**](http://community.livejournal.com/issenterprise/)

James Tiberius Kirk is running for his life.

_Up seventeen steps. Down thirteen. Up thirteen. Down eleven. Keep moving._

At the top of the stairway is the hall that leads to the observation deck. Sometimes the hall is empty, sometimes senior officers and their attendants pass through. No one meets his eyes, not even the ones who finally gave in to his screaming demand to be allowed to take the test before they consider expelling him.

_Up seven. Down thirteen._ Sweat trickling down his neck. _Focus._

At the bottom of the stairway is the hall that leads to the bridge simulator. Cadets in gray, milling, waiting.

"Psychotic."

"Fucking nuts."

"At least dying is going to be interesting today."

_Up thirteen. Down two. Up eleven. Delegate. Remember to delegate._

At the top, more officers are gathering, expecting a spectacle of failure.

"What's he doing?"

"He appears to be counting the steps in a sequence of prime numbers." Vulcan. Has to be.

The familiar stunned pause. "But why?"

"I do not know."

_Down five. Fuck. Going to get stuck unless we cheat. Focus! Up one. Down eleven._

At the bottom, the cadets are hostile, armed.

"Pretty, isn't he?"

"Pretty stupid."

"Watch it. Did you hear what he did to Finnegan?"

_Up seventeen._

At the top, there's a drudge carrying a tray with a meal that includes an apple. There's no stopping himself, he snatches the apple and the drudge's mouth gapes open woefully above the mute scar slit across her throat.

Behind her, a sharp young officer in black stops and his hazel-green eyes narrow, but Kirk is already back on the stairs, _down seven, up two, down thirteen,_ fingers cradling the smooth skin of the apple. Telling himself he can eat it only if he can keep waiting to get in the simulator without attacking anyone.

Finally, they let the cadets in, and Kirk immediately prowls around the perimeter of the bridge, noting every discrepancy from a real Constitution-class ship, then reviewing the positions and names of all the crew. _Use names,_ he reminds himself. _Delegate. Focus._

He takes a deep breath, sits in the chair. _His chair. His crew. His ship._ God, how he needs this. He sets the apple on the arm of the chair, then reconsiders and tucks it alongside him on the seat. A reward. _Focus._ He rubs his hands on his thighs, glances up at the crowded observation window, not caring if he looks nervous. They've seen it all. But they haven't seen him.

Under way, and his breathing calms and his mind clears. A distress call. A by-the-book response. Three K'tinga class warbirds, and he's ready.

"The central ship -- magnify!" The viewer leaps forward and it's there, the simulation is up to date. His heart soars. He knows what to do. He punches buttons on the arm of the chair, putting up tactical overlays on the viewscreen.

"Hastings, send them the standard warnings. Weapons, prepare a warning torpedo targeted on the bridge of Ship One to fire on my mark. Helm, ah, Midgely, take us down forty degrees, roll one hundred twenty degrees. Phasers, acquire targets on Ship Two only, as we come within range. Nav. Jenner. I will need a very precise course from you when they start to react, be prepared."

They hate him, but training overrules the hate and they jump to his commands. He's on his feet, pacing behind the nav console and watching the scenario unfold, eyes flicking from section to section on the tactical display. Less than two seconds. He can't wait, picks up the apple, takes a bite, feels the rush of sunshine sweetness.

The Klingons start to fire and he braces. "Shields at 86%," his tactical officer says after the first impact, and he whirls.

"That's not possible!" He leans over her shoulder, enraged, fingers demanding more detail from her console even as more torpedoes hit and the shields drop further. There's no Klingon torpedo in existence, even theoretically, that's capable of shredding a shield that much in a single hit. The numbers fly through his head -- no, it's not possible, not even if they do to him he what he plans to do to them.

"Captain!"

He pivots again. "Fuck. _Fuck._ Fire torpedoes at Ship One. Midgely, keep us aligned in plane with Ship Two so phasers can maintain lock on the forward torpedo bay. Maintain primary shield strength against fire from Ship Three until we are past them."

"Past them, sir?"

He snarls, eyes on the screens, watching the three ships start to maneuver, seeing into the minds of their captains, their helmsmen, projecting how sensitively they're going to react, and the vectors click into place.

"Jenner, heading 186.3427." Someone snickers, and his nostrils flare.

"Midgely, I need impulse power, point six two five, on my mark." The precision is unusual but it matters and it's just a matter of inputting numbers so when the redhead looks worriedly over his shoulder and questions the command, the apple is out of his hand, thunking furiously and messily on Midgely's forehead, before Kirk even thinks. He pulls the stunned helmsman to the floor with a growl, takes the chair and places a boot on his throat, checks the nav, and sends the ship diving forward himself.

"All phasers fire! Torpedoes, keep them distracted, hold bank three in reserve. Comm, tell the _Maru_ to get the hell out of the Zone if they can move."

He threads the needle, warbirds pivoting and pursuing just as he expects, the commander's ship unable to fire through damaged torpedo tubes, and the rest at a disadvantage because of the way he rolls the ship, better than Midgely ever could. He ignores the choking noises under his foot, listens to tactical ticking down their remaining shield strength and tries to think what else he should be delegating. "Alert medical bay to prepare to receive all crew members from the damaged ship."

The three ships are increasing speed, getting closer to each other. "Tactical, target torpedoes from bank three _between_ the ships..." he stutters for a second, needs to efficiently communicate the numbers he sees so clearly in his head, fingers twitching across the console to add imaginary targets to the tactical display. "Here and...._here._ Wait for it, wait, and.....Fire! Prepare to detonate remotely."

The torpedoes are away and he holds his breath as they twinkle across space, watching them catch up to the empty space between warbirds just as their shields start to overlap. "Now! Now! Now!"

Two explosions blossom, and keep blossoming, augmenting each other and causing a wave of harmonic feedback to ripple across the shields. The mathematics of what happens to shields when they're tangent to one another is obscure, strange, a weakness no one else knows about yet and to be honest, Kirk's not certain that it will work as neatly with real, messy weapons systems as it does in simulation. But here he is fierce and elated. "Yes!" he shouts. "Fire everything! Knock them down!"

Five seconds later it's over, the debris of three Klingon ships rocketing deeper into the Zone, and he's breathing hard, scanning for signs of other ships, cloaked or otherwise. The bridge is utterly silent, aside from the simulated comm chatter. That's it? That's the no-win situation? He glances up briefly; the observation window is buzzing with activity.

He grins and licks his lips; they can't get rid of him now. He might as well finish this off right, this part of the simulation no one's ever done before. "Jenner, take us back to the _Kobayashi Maru_. Security, I need a team to secure the _Maru_ from possible Klingon intruders. Engineering, a team to prepare the _Maru_ for travel or towing. Transporter room, prepare to take casualties aboard when --"

Kirk screams as Midgely's knife plunges into his calf, and he's out of the helmsman's chair, knocking his knife-hand to the side and landing on him because his leg won't hold him up. He's swearing at the top of his lungs as they grapple, and others are shouting too. He gets a good shot in to the bridge of the man's nose and is reaching for his own knife when the doors open and Barnett strides in. The MPs flanking him quickly seize both combatants and pull them apart. The other cadets are summarily dismissed.

Kirk can't stand being held, can't stop himself, he snarls and struggles against the two brutish Vulcans pinning his arms even as he feels the blood running into his boot. A brief jolt of the agonizer leaves him limp and he listens distantly as Midgely is scolded for questioning a commanding officer and then dragged off to the agony booth for his attack. He sees the apple lying at the foot of the command chair, somewhat the worse for wear and oozing juice onto the floor, and his mouth starts watering.

Barnett has to slap his face to get his attention.

"Cadet Kirk! What sort of command performance was that?"

He's still lightheaded, exhilarated, full of adrenaline from the fight and the space battle, from winning the no-win. He tries to stand up a little straighter on the good leg, and the smile won't stop and the words come tumbling out. "I beat your fucking test."

Barnett scowls at him, gesturing at the MP, who applies the agonizer again. "Manners, Kirk. We'll figure out how you cheated later." Kirk's sudden rage means nothing to him; he just looks at the MP. "An hour," he says, "for insubordination."

"Admiral, if I may?" The green-eyed, sharp-eyed lieutenant steps down onto the command deck, brown hair neatly parted. Kirk watches him carefully to make sure he doesn't step on the apple.

"Doctor McCoy?"

"Sir, the boy's certainly earned at least an hour, but the other cadet has cut through his Achilles' tendon; that needs to be tended before anything else can happen if you want him walking when you're done with him."

Barnett's nose wrinkles in distaste, but he knows better than to cripple one of Nogura's toys. He glances back up toward the observation window.

"Fine. Heal him." He gestures, and turns on his heel and leaves, and the MPs drop Kirk back into the command chair and slap a pair of magnetic cuffs onto his wrists. He's still fuming about the accusation of cheating, but his attention is grabbed when the doctor bends down and retrieves the apple. He looks curiously at Kirk for a moment before setting the still-tempting if battered piece of fruit down on a console out of Kirk's reach, and turns to the drudge trotting up behind him with a medkit.

He's efficient about putting Kirk's tendon back together, and when he rises gracefully and says, "All yours, gentlemen," to the MPs, Kirk is a little surprised to realize that he didn't just stop at the tendon as many doctors would; there's no pain in either leg when they haul him to his feet. But the doctor also has the apple back in his hand.

His bound hands reach out for it.

"_'And there never was an apple, in Adam's opinion, that wasn't worth the trouble you got into for eating it,'_ " the doctor says, considering the cracked piece of fruit. "But you haven't earned this one, dirty and bruised as it is. Your response to the admiral was ill-considered."

"It's still good. Don't throw it away."

His eyebrows rise, slightly, but he doesn't otherwise acknowledge Kirk's plea, merely steps aside to let the MPs drag Kirk off to be disciplined.

Losing the apple hurts more.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> McCoy just watched Kirk defeat the _Kobayashi Maru_. Now, he has a decision to make.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Warnings:** Mirror!verse, but mild for it: battery, agony booth, implication of planned rape.
> 
> Originally [posted](http://community.livejournal.com/issenterprise/33730.html) to [](http://community.livejournal.com/issenterprise/profile)[**issenterprise**](http://community.livejournal.com/issenterprise/)

Leonard McCoy watches.

He leans back in the shadows of the disciplinary center, rolling the cracked apple in his fingers, gaze never leaving Kirk where he stands in the agony booth. The way the booth plays the nervous system against itself usually drives people writhing to their knees, but Kirk never wavers; he glares out at the crowd of other cadets gathered, enemies all, with the intensity of a lion at the zoo. McCoy knows their hatred without looking at them: they hate Kirk for succeeding where everyone else has failed, or for cheating when no one else has been able to. For lashing out at one of their own, or for not playing the alliance game at all. For coming into the Academy three years ago straight from Nogura's own ship, a genius child with the hallowed Kirk name and the Fleet's high hopes clinging to him like a cloud of incense.

The boy's brilliance hasn't withered, but their hopes must have; at sixteen Kirk is savage and unpredictable, and only the old pederast's influence has kept him out of the hands of the doctors who can declare him unfit for the service. He has no friends, his father and his brother are dead, and his mother is kept out of his reach in the dark between the stars.

A faint waft of sweetness reaches his nose from the fruit. He considers it for a moment, and turns his attention back to Kirk.

_Don't throw it away. It's still good._

Less than two hours ago, he'd gotten his first look at the child everyone else wanted to discard. He watched Kirk soundly defeat the _Kobayashi Maru_; McCoy figures he used the torpedoes to cause the simulated Klingon's shields to feed back on themselves in some fashion, though he doesn't understand the physics well enough to sort out exactly how, or _if_ such a trick would work outside of a computer. Either way, he's sure the boy didn't cheat, didn't somehow hack into Lieutenant Commander Spock's carefully designed program. Whatever Kirk had done, he'd been sure it would work on its own merits.

He'll get a copy of the debriefing report later; some of the answers he needs will be in there. He's sent a politely worded request to his grandmother; many more of them will be in the combination of the two documents. But most of what he wants to know is right in front of him.

He studies the tension in Kirk's narrow shoulders and hips. He's definitely still a boy, which means _if_ he's to be of use McCoy will have to get him out of Admiral Nogura's compound. Though it _has_ been three years; if the bastard hasn't broken him by now, McCoy doubts anyone will. Kirk has learned how to divorce himself from the physical indignities Nogura likes to inflict, a skill serving him well in the booth.

The mechanism is working on him; subtle shivers and shudders run through Kirk's muscles and the fingers curling lightly against his thighs, but the only thing the booth can evoke, after all, is _physical_ pain. And Kirk's clearly aware, from the way his bright wary eyes flick around the room, that pain is the least of his worries, particularly when the clear chirp of a communicator sends a stir through the room.

McCoy watches, eyebrow raised slightly; the Vulcan guard answers the call, and his dark eyes flick toward Kirk. Though his expression never changes, McCoy knows he doesn't like the order he just received. The guard closes the communicator and reaches out to punch a code into the wall console. McCoy hears the subliminal whine of the security camera fade, shortly before the booth reaches the end of its cycle. The two Vulcans simply walk out of the room.

McCoy leans forward, slightly. Perhaps half of the cadets leave with the guards, wanting no part of whatever's about to happen, or having too many demerits of their own to risk getting caught. Though Barnett's ordered this -- or Nogura has. McCoy considers, then discards the latter idea. Nogura's absence is message enough to Kirk.

The boy straightens and pushes the booth's door open, baring a flash of white teeth. The crowd hesitates. Their prey is not as vulnerable as they thought. McCoy considers intervening now, before they gather themselves and attack, because Kirk is only putting up a good front. Mind over body or not, he's likely weaker than a kitten.

But he's still not certain he's ready to take responsibility for the boy, and so he waits in the shadows; index finger tapping against the tacky skin of the apple. The cadets swarm forward, but Kirk's surprisingly ready -- he breaks someone's nose with the heel of his hand before landing a solid punch to the beefy leader's solar plexus, enough to give Kirk a four-step break toward the door.

McCoy will give him the bravery, and an impressive stubborn streak, but neither are enough to protect him from the overwhelming press of the mob. When he sees Kirk's legs swept from beneath him, he stands and moves closer, but he doesn't intervene until they stuff a gag in Kirk's mouth to keep him from biting, hands pulling arms roughly behind his back while other hands tear at the fastenings of his uniform.

"_Enough_," McCoy snarls, pitched to carry. The command cuts through the sounds of the struggle and most of the cadets straighten to face him. Kirk doesn't, but then the beefy bald cadet has his hand pressed hard into the small of Kirk's back where he's got the boy bent over a table. McCoy lets his eyes rake over all of them, coolly taking in those faces he doesn't know to attach to names later. "Out."

To a one, they obey; he's an officer, he ranks them, and none of them want to spend their own eternity in an agony booth. Kirk warily rolls to face him, reaching up to yank the gag out of his mouth. He spits blood, and the part of McCoy that never seems to know better wants to run a scanner over him and see what needs mending.

But the boy hasn't earned it, and he hasn't asked for it. His blazing blue eyes catch on the apple in McCoy's fingers, then come back up to McCoy's face.

"What do you want?" Kirk snaps, taut and balanced, prepared for another attack. McCoy raises an eyebrow, and the boy glares for a moment more before his eyes drop to the apple again. "Sir."

"Do you play chess, Cadet Kirk?"

Kirk's startlement and confusion are so plain in the way his eyes widen and his brow furrows that McCoy almost laughs. "Chess?"

McCoy smiles, thin and dangerous. "Yes. Chess. Just you and I."

Kirk's nostrils twitch, like some feral thing trying to guess whether the scent of food means survival or yet another trap. But he wavers, the lines smoothing from his forehead as curiosity begins to win out over suspicion.

"When?" He slowly draws the front of his torn jacket closed, fastens it without looking down.

"Now's good, if you're up for it," McCoy says with a shrug. "There's an overflow mess in the med center that no one should be using."

McCoy counts his own heartbeats, gets to five before Kirk decides with a sharp nod. "All right. No doctoring, though."

McCoy snorts, and tosses the apple over; Kirk's hands come up warp-fast and it smacks juicily into his palms. The grin Kirk offers in return is huge and white and strangely innocent, but he doesn't let his guard down because of the treat. He follows McCoy into the evening darkness, keeping them within each other's peripheral vision but out of arm's reach. His eyes are alert to everything around him while he happily crunches the apple right down to the core.

McCoy opens a side door to the med center and leads Kirk into the empty mess hall, rarely used for anything other than passing the time. He pulls an old-fashioned 2D chess set out of a cabinet full of dice, cards, and ancient board games.

Kirk chooses a seat in the corner, and reaches out to start setting up the board, taking the black pieces for himself. McCoy settles into the chair, watching him; Kirk's hands deftly drop the pieces in place, no signs of tremors or hesitation, as though his body has already forgotten the pain of the booth and the beating. He's focused on getting the board set up, but his eyes flick to McCoy's face at regular intervals.

When Kirk finishes, McCoy turns the board so the white pieces are in front of Kirk, and lifts an eyebrow slightly. Kirk shrugs and advances his knight; McCoy chooses a predictable opening that leaves Kirk many options, and Kirk responds swiftly, making each of his moves as soon as McCoy's let his piece go. The boy's lips, still speckled with dried blood, twist a little as he takes his first few pieces; predictable apparently doesn't earn McCoy much respect in Kirk's book.

If he's right, nothing but a solid victory will. Time to change the game a little.

"What did you think of the simulation?" McCoy asks, dropping a captured pawn back in the worn cardboard box.

"Pfegh. Real Klingon torpedoes aren't that powerful." Disgust thickens Kirk's voice.

"Do you think the simulator is meant to be realistic?"

"Why bother, otherwise? I mean yes, I know it's supposed to be no-win, but why make people throw out all the real-world things they've been taught? Just put in a few extra ships or something." Kirk takes McCoy's bishop, leaving his knight vulnerable to an easily sacrificed pawn.

"What do you think they're testing?"

He pauses over the board for a moment, eyes flicking through possibilities, makes a slightly more cautious move. "Fear. Decisiveness."

"No. Leadership, even in the face of death. And even without the results being back, I think you'd better prepare yourself for another defeat."

Kirk snarls and grips the edge of the table, his knuckles showing yellow beneath his bruised skin.

McCoy sighs. The boy has no control over his emotions; a dangerous flaw he'll need to be broken of, but one McCoy can exploit for his purposes right now. "Do you think you led effectively?"

"I told them what to do, they did it, and everybody lived." His voice is harsh, strained. "No one else has ever done that. I don't have to be nice about it, do I?"

McCoy captures his bishop with a knight. "Of course not. No one would respect you if you were. What makes an effective leader? Your mother, for example."

"She'd beat the shit out of anyone who tried to cross her."

"And does that make her an _effective_ leader?"

Kirk studies the board, brows drawn down over blue eyes in concentration, not confusion. Pondering the game, or the conversation? "I don't know. She's strong. People just listen to her." He moves another pawn forward.

"People aren't as simple to figure out as equations, true, but people generally do things for reasons. Not always good reasons, not always sound reasons, but there are _always_ reasons." McCoy ignores the bait, moves a rook to threaten Kirk's remaining knight. "Why is relying on your ability to beat the shit out of people a bad idea?"

His cheek twitches. "Because sometimes they have me at a disadvantage."

"And more generally?"

Kirk pushes away from the table, sending the chair skittering backward in a burst of energy. McCoy tracks him, noting that even in the moment of temper Kirk had been careful not to disturb the pieces on the board. And this isn't the time for a reprimand; too much to learn when Kirk's on the edge.

"If they'd just _listen_ to me they'd be better off." He backs away from the table, raking a restless hand across his chest. His voice is thick and bitter.

"Why should anyone believe that?"

"I just _showed_ them why!" Kirk paces around the edges of the room, slapping the wall hard as he goes. McCoy adds bruised palms to his mental list of Kirk's current injuries. "I don't belong here, I belong up there. This place is just a hell I need to go through to get there. I know ships better than anyone else on this filthy rock, I know ships, I know tactics, I know our enemies and if they'd just put me _out there_ I would show them all!"

Interesting, that Earth is just another rock to him.

"And do you think you're showing me why I should believe you, right now?" McCoy leans back in the chair, arms folded over his chest, watching Kirk move. "Because, frankly, what I see is a spoiled child who I wouldn't put in charge of a tribble, let alone a starship."

"I'm just in the wrong _place_."

"Yes, of course." McCoy will offer only boredom in response to teenage whining. Kirk rubs his thumbs across his fists, then makes himself stride back over to the table. He moves his queen boldly across the board with a sharp clack.

"You don't know what I'm capable of," he says, still standing, leaning over the back of the chair. It might be intimidating in someone else.

"No," McCoy agrees, mildly, "but I know something you don't. What you're capable of doesn't matter."

He studies the board for a moment, and then captures Kirk's queen with a pawn. "Checkmate in two."

Kirk looks up into McCoy's eyes, startled, then down at the board again. His lips tighten and he searches the board, unwilling to take McCoy's word for it. McCoy waits to see if Kirk can find the one move that will upset his prediction; within a second, he slides his rook forward.

"Forgive me. In four." Again, he doesn't bother to hide the boredom. Pleasure at proof of Kirk's strategic intelligence, on the other hand, he keeps to himself.

Kirk makes him play out the four moves. The refusal to resign isn't unexpected in the face of what McCoy has already seen today.

"Again," Kirk demands.

"Another time. You're not sufficiently in control of yourself to be a worthwhile opponent."

"No! I can do this." He sits in the chair again. "I want to play."

McCoy rests his chin on his steepled fingers, considering whether or not the boy's potential is worth the effort. Finally, he nods.

"Once more. Set up the board."

This time, the game is almost silent, and Kirk takes more time between moves. McCoy shows the same focus, and in the end the best the child can do is fight him to a draw. Kirk is frustrated, but also fascinated; McCoy suspects it's been a long time since anyone has beaten him at chess. Or even agreed to play a second game.

"One more? Please?"

"No. Not tonight." McCoy rises to his feet.

"When, then? Where?"

"Here. And I won't be available again until late Sunday morning." They're going to have to start by teaching Kirk a little patience.

Kirk nods, and hurries to leave. McCoy shakes his head, eyes narrowed, watching him go. The boy and his abilities will fit neatly into his plans for the future, but there are a lot of ifs. He's not a fan of uncertainty, and getting the cadet ready will mean a certain amount of re-structuring.

Nevertheless. He's used to challenge, and if things don't pan out with Kirk himself he can see a number of ways taking the boy under his wing will still be useful.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The aftermath of Kirk's _Kobyashi Maru_ continues; McCoy talks to his wife, makes a new ally, and plays another game of chess

It wouldn't have been that difficult to wave the McCoy name and get a seat in the chamber for Kirk's hearing on Friday morning, but he chooses to watch on a screen in the next room.

The Vulcan lieutenant commander who designed the test -- Spock, McCoy recalls -- does a good job explaining how Kirk didn't cheat, couldn't have cheated, even if he'd somehow gotten access to the simulator or its code ahead of time. Kirk leans on the lectern, fuming, trying to argue his case with some modicum of logic, but his unpredictable behavior has always overshadowed his genius and defeating the _Maru_ scenario changes nothing. It doesn't help that Barnett knows exactly how to manipulate Kirk's emotions; his control crumbles and in the end he is dragged out of the chamber kicking and screaming.

McCoy shakes his head and steps toward the doorway, arriving just in time to see the child collapse away from the hypospray pressed to his neck. He feels a mild temptation to intervene, but there's no sense advertising his interest in Kirk.

Other parties are not so discreet. Barnett's security lifts Kirk onto a floating cot, Nogura's goons have arrived to take him into their custody, and Spock has stepped out of the tribunal and is speaking to both in low, urgent tones.

McCoy taps on his padd, idly pulling up the Kirk dossier his grandmother sent him, waiting to see who's going to end up with the boy. He's already calculating what effect each might have on his plans. Barnett, key player for the Academy brass, has technical jurisdiction here; his custody would be acceptable though unpleasant for Kirk. And talking him out of the planned expulsion might be expensive. However, Nogura's claim has precedence, and he's more influential in the Fleet itself, more dangerous to Barnett and more damaging to Kirk, even if his interest in the boy appears to be waning.

Spock, on the other hand, is an unknown quantity. McCoy can't yet puzzle out what possible advantage would push the Vulcan to dispute two already clear claims, or what power base would make it anything other than a clumsy form of bureaucratic suicide. It's unlikely he'll prevail, but it's possibly the best outcome for Kirk. Vulcans, for all their vaunted logic, are not known for their patience with those who would harm a child.

As in the beginning of Kirk's Starfleet career, Nogura wins out. McCoy catches the slight shake of Spock's head when he turns and walks away, wonders for a moment who he's reporting to. Or if he reports to anyone; McCoy knows precious little of his story. Perhaps the Vulcan would make a good ally.

For now, though, it's Kirk who concerns him. His eyes narrow, slightly, as he considers the limp form being guided out of the room. The boy's father had been another Nogura protege, bright but tame, who'd received all the highest decorations after his noble and idiotic death. McCoy remembers the way the press played down the fact that George Kirk had sacrificed his life to save his wife and infant son, encouraging people instead to believe that he was a martyr for the Empire. The dossier notes a significant spike in 'Fleet enrollment that year and for several following, which only confirms the stupidity of the masses, in McCoy's eyes.

Winona Kirk parlayed the Empire's lionization of her dead husband into permission to bring her young boys with her on the _Yorktown_ when she was redeployed. A waste, really; she could have traded up for far more, including an earthbound posting, or a position at Court for one or both children -- but, oddly, McCoy thinks he understands. She most likely felt the boys would be safer with her, and as far away from the Fleet's propaganda machine as possible. He might have done the same in her shoes; it would have been a calculated risk, but his grandmother is right. Having a child changes the way you see the world.

He pulls up the padd's message system and types up a quick note to his wife: _Who are you sleeping with tonight, Jocelyn?_

Neither his grandmother nor McCoy's own research and connections have been able to reveal very much about the boy after the Kirks shipped out. Some immunization records. A few mentions in the _Yorktown_'s logs. A couple of stops at starbases. No recorded schooling, just yearly standardized tests. All of which came back anything _but_ standard; as far as McCoy can tell, Kirk has been off the charts -- in the same way he himself has -- for most of his life.

A soft chime from the padd, a message in the corner of his screen. _Some pretty boy._

_He'd better not be a repeat,_ he sends back, smiling just a little. _Hate to have to get my hands dirty. Where's Jo?_

A strange, wandering childhood in space. And then nothing. A sudden void starting five years ago, as though Kirk ceased to exist until he showed up in Nogura's claws on the _Kongo_. Not a hint, not a whisper.

Normally, that sort of vanishing act would change McCoy's mind about Kirk's utility; _no one_ vanishes from the Empire's records so thoroughly without some very powerful help. But the boy's reappearance hasn't provoked any response from on high, which to McCoy's mind suggests it was the circumstances and not Kirk himself that were "disappeared."

_At home with her very expensive nanny. What are you doing tonight?_

Five years. There's some other whisper tickling at his memory from that time frame, something he wasn't supposed to have overheard, but the details are vague. He catches himself rubbing his thumb over the corner of his mouth. Something about a failed colony? Something that should have made the news, but hadn't. His instincts insist there's a connection.

If Kirk knows something he's not supposed to know, they should have gotten rid of him. Nogura -- or someone else -- must have thought his potential was worth the risk. And it was possible they had tried to make him forget; if so, that might explain some of Kirk's instability. Humans tend to think a Vulcan adept can do anything they want to a person's brain, but McCoy knows that there are consequences.

_Taking Gran to dinner._

There are always consequences.

~~~

The evening with his grandmother is informative and exhausting, as always, but the plans he's shared with her are the sharper for it, and if he has learned anything about reading her eyebrows over the years, he thinks he may have earned a sliver of approval from her.

He doesn't tell her everything, of course.

He knows more about the Kirks, and about the _half-_Vulcan, Spock. And she swore that she had no idea whatsoever about any rumored colony, five years ago or otherwise. She insisted colonies were boring; the only one she had any recollection of at all was the launch of the very boring agricultural station at Tarsus, and then only because it had the bad taste to share the news page with the shocking murder of her second husband.

It's a place to start, though her equivocation, particularly during a private dinner, tells him a great deal about how dangerous it may be to start digging.

After morning rounds, and a brief call to talk with his daughter during which he learns that the latest nanny smells "of old snails," McCoy heads down to the bridge simulator. Although Kirk's _Maru_ hadn't destroyed it, there will still be details to change and programming to replace, and it therefore seems the most _logical_ place to find Lieutenant Commander Spock.

The observation and management deck is empty, but through the window he sees Spock standing on the simulation floor, staring out at what would be the viewscreen if the bridge were real or the program active. His hands are folded neatly behind his back. McCoy can't see his face, so there's no way to know if his gaze is directed inward or outward, though he suspects this would be an odd place to find a Vulcan meditating.

But then, Spock isn't exactly one's average Vulcan.

He lifts his face to the window, and meets McCoy's eyes. A faint inclination of the head, and he turns smoothly to return to the observation deck.

When Spock enters the room, McCoy sketches a precise bow, indicating respect for Spock's superior rank without positioning himself as the man's inferior, and keeps his expression neutral to avoid offending him. "Lieutenant Commander."

"Doctor." His body language is calm and still, like any Vulcan. And yet McCoy senses tension, wariness in him.

_Not so unalike_, McCoy thinks. Two predators, neither willing to give the other too much. Spock has the advantage in territory, but McCoy suspects he is better informed. He chooses to be blunt, to see if he can catch Spock off-guard.

"I observed the tribunal yesterday. What is your interest in Cadet Kirk?"

The tiniest twitch of an eyebrow. "His abilities are unusual."

"I agree," he says, folding his hands behind his back in a subtle mirror of Spock's posture. "But Admiral Nogura has no use for them, and Admiral Barnett would rather dismiss them altogether and have him removed from the Academy. I'd like to see him reach his potential. And you?"

Spock does not hesitate in his reply, but McCoy has no doubt each word is carefully considered. "I fail to comprehend the Empire's neglect of his abilities and his sanity. If they do not have a use for him, then I feel it is my duty to see that he is not turned against us."

"He would make a formidable enemy, if he lives that long. And he will do whatever it takes to get back into space."

Dark eyes tilt. He is done justifying himself. "Perhaps, as a medical officer, you have means of access to him that I do not." It's an offer; McCoy automatically counters.

"It will take more clout than I have on my own to keep him in the Academy."

This time there is a minute pause before Spock chooses what to put on the table.

"Commander Pike's intention was to suggest that he be placed on a mandatory medical leave -- from which he would have the option to return -- instead of expelling him."

McCoy nods, mind racing; he'd already settled on a similar plan. Commander Christopher Pike is very much a rising star within the 'Fleet; brilliant and dangerous, the kind of man who makes a good ally and has few surviving enemies.

And _Pike_'s interest in Kirk is both far more fascinating and potentially more devastating to McCoy's plans than Spock's.

He watches the Vulcan's expression closely. "I would be willing to provide physiological or psychological support for such a suggestion, and would be willing to keep him in my care until such time as we are prepared to argue he is fit to resume his studies."

Spock's eyes narrow infinitesimally; something about McCoy's suggestion doesn't mesh with _his_ plans. Or Pike's. "I believe that telepathic intervention may be useful with him."

"Of course you will want to confirm that he is receiving the best care possible during his convalescence. I have no intention of denying access." But neither does he guarantee that he'll let Spock into the boy's mind.

Spock accepts this with a simple blink.

"Admiral Nogura has been holding the cadet incommunicado since the hearing. The commander has asked me to arrange a petition for his release from a neutral Vulcan adept," he continues. If Pike doesn't want to be directly involved in this, then he also has long-term plans involving Kirk. And Spock clearly has a place in them, though McCoy's not sure what common goals the ambitious commander and the Vulcan outcast in front of him might have. "The weight of your medical opinion would make it more difficult for the Admiral to justify turning the petition down."

"Agreed. So long as I retain custody of the boy and oversight of his care."

"For the duration of his medical leave."

McCoy doesn't quite mask the quirk of his own eyebrows. "Logically."

"Then I will await your report."

"First thing Monday morning."

Spock accepts this with a nod, and turns back to his computer.

McCoy accepts the brusque dismissal, biting back a sharp comment that will gain him nothing. He could have written something adequate this evening, based on his observations of Kirk, but Sunday will give him another chess game. Nogura or not, he knows Kirk _wants_ to play again. And he doubts the boy will let much of anything get in his way.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kirk breaks free of Nogura, and has to make a choice.

It's Sunday morning. Time to play a game. Kirk leaves Nogura's compound at dawn, trailing the blood of the guard who tried to stop him. He's cleaned his hands by the time he arrives at the med building, but there's still a tremor running through his frame as he lies on his back on one of the refectory tables, staring up into the reflective cubes of the light fixtures and waits.

He waits a long time.

McCoy finally arrives, closes the door behind him.

Kirk turns only his eyes to look at him, and his cheek starts to twitch. The vivid gold-green eyes are stark and stern in a skeletal face, papery skin over jutting bones. The smell of dust and death is thick in the room.

The doctor's voice is distant. "_Because_ I said we'd play today, we will. But only one game."

The game. Helpless kings backed into corners, teeth bared, dragged down into death by vicious ghouls.

"Are you listening to me?" The skeleton watching him with the doctor's eyes snaps its fingers. "Kirk?"

"I don't give in that easily," Kirk mutters. The chain clanks as he scratches under the manacle on his wrist.

"Don't give in to what?"

"They think they're rid of me..." he grins maliciously, fingers digging in deeper.

"You're about to draw blood. What are you digging at?" The corpse shuffles closer, slowly.

He stops scratching, draws his manacled hands up in front of his face, wrists held close together by the short heavy chain. "Free soon, slide riiiight out into the stars. And like that," he blows on his fingertips, "I'm gone."

The wasted thing reaches out to grip Kirk's captive wrist, then jabs a skeletal finger into his neck. The fight dies out of him and his hands slump down to the tabletop, unchained.

* * *

Kirk wakes up on a thin mattress with the familiar pinging of a biobed above his head. He sits up, pulling his hands up in front of him, readouts singing a faster song. Doctor McCoy calmly watches his gaze dart around the room; he looks normal enough, sitting to one side, feet up on the bed. What matters to Kirk, however, is the wheeled tray at his elbow, holding a plate of steaming food. Kirk pulls it close, wrapping a defensive arm around the meal, and starts stuffing vegetables into his mouth with his fingers. He tries to blot out the smell of dust.

"The good news is, Nogura is unlikely to have a chance to starve you again. Though I do hate having my hand forced. How does your head feel right now?"

"Blurry."

McCoy's lips purse slightly. "Trouble focusing? Do I look like me, or like something else?"

"You look like you."

"But I didn't earlier."

"You looked like you then, too." _Only dead._ But Kirk has learned not to say these things.

McCoy grunts. "You thought your wrists were bound, and they weren't. You were hallucinating."

"Bullshit. If I was the type to be seeing things, there'd be some hint of it in my medical record, wouldn't there?" He tilts his head innocently, but his eyes are shrewd as they flick infinitesimally towards the padd the doctor is writing on. McCoy's eyebrow lifts, then he sets the padd aside.

"Off the record, then."

Kirk studies him. McCoy's wearing the same patient, challenging look Kirk saw across the chessboard -- competent, measuring, without pity or contempt. He turns his attention back to the tray. It has an apple on it, perfect and plump and blood-red.

"You looked like you. Only dead."

McCoy doesn't blink. "Anyone else look dead to you?"

"Everyone, earlier. But I knew it wasn't real. And there's no one else here now."

"No, there isn't. When did everyone start looking dead?"

Kirk grins. "I'm pretty sure this one is really dead." He lifts up the sleeve that's stiff with dried blood. McCoy rolls his eyes.

"That was early this morning," Kirk continues, "before the sun came up. After that...corpses everywhere."

"Like Tarsus."

Kirk pushes more shreds of meat into his mouth. "I didn't think that was in my record either." The burnt dust smell is thicker, seeping in under the door.

"It isn't." He scratches above an eyebrow.

"So what else do you know about me?"

"I know that you're brilliant, tactically, that you have no self-control, that you are the spoiled child I thought you were, you have no allies and no family left except your mother, who you haven't been allowed to see since Nogura brought you here. Shall I go on?" He said the name _Nogura_ as if it tasted of rancid oil.

"And am I as crazy as they say?" Kirk says it with an ironic smile, because he's watching the flesh dwindle from McCoy's bones little by little, starvation at stardrive speed. Most days he knows what's real and what's not, and he fights to focus on what the doctor is saying, not what he looks like.

"That's exactly what I've been trying to figure out." He leans back in his chair. "Yes. You're crazy. Possibly crazier than they say. But that was never the question."

"What is the question, Doctor McCoy?"

"Whether you're too crazy to be useful. To yourself, or anyone else."

"They should put me out there and find out." He runs a finger along the edges of his empty plate, licks off the last few bits of sauce, then sucks each finger thoroughly clean, watching the doctor's eyes. It's not a provocation that seems to work on him.

"Who says _they_ are asking?"

"_You're_ asking? And who are you?" He lifts the apple off the tray, feeling its skin real and smooth under his fingers, but only holds it for now; he doesn't want to be distracted from what McCoy is saying.

"Someone with long-range plans." McCoy gets up and checks a reading on the bed, then checks Kirk's eyes with a penlight. "All you really need to know is that I have enough clout to keep you here, and away from Nogura. If I decide you're worth it."

"So we're back to what do you want." The afterimage of the light in his eyes has become a sun, shining brightly through the ceiling of the room, and dirt is sifting across the floor. Kirk wrinkles his nose faintly in disgust. The doctor's fierce eyes are more gold than green now, sharper. Kirk presses his fingers delicately against the skin of the apple, careful not to bruise.

"Believe it or not, I want to see you on the bridge of your own ship one day."

Kirk's breath catches. Desire thrums through him. "My own ship."

"Eventually. But you have to be able to follow orders."

"Convince me you know what you're doing." He pauses, narrows his eyes. "That's what I didn't do with Midgely."

"Very good. And it was my point about your mother, too. And yes, you beat the _Maru_, and no, I don't think you cheated, but it doesn't matter, because none of them believe you're competent enough to do the job it's testing you for."

He shoves the wheeled tray away in frustration -- but not towards the doctor. "I get it. The odds are against me, and no one will give me a chance to show what I can do. And even when I do, it doesn't _matter_."

"They don't believe you're worth the risk. You don't follow orders, even when it's in your best interest, you refuse to think anyone could possibly know more than you do, you don't bother to control your temper or hone your revenge until it's something more than petty. I could go on, Kirk. Hate him all you want but you're only still alive because of Nogura's protection -- now, you either learn to manage yourself or your life is going to be very short." He looks very soberly at Kirk, running his tongue thoughtfully over a predator's sharp teeth. "Obedience isn't about respect."

Kirk pulls his knees up, avoids looking up at the broad arid sky above him. "I keep telling myself to 'play the game, play the game, play the game', 'cause I know it's the only way I'm ever going to get back out there. On a Starfleet ship, anyway." He's not pleased with the alternatives -- he'd be a hell of a pirate but scavenging is for the weak. "It's just so hard to remember when the world goes red."

"Controlling yourself is nothing so casual as a game. It is a matter of life or death, both here in the 'Fleet and at Court. I won't deny that anger can be useful. But you have to put reins on it. Hone it down, sharpen it, keep it on the edge until the right moment to unleash it. Otherwise, it's a weakness. Usually a fatal one."

He looks at Kirk for a very long time, golden feline eyes narrowed.

"I don't negotiate," he finally says. "In two days, you'll see Nogura dead or in serious disgrace. That should be proof enough that I know what I'm doing."

"You're -- _you_ are going to take down Nogura? He's been king of the mountain for, like, a hundred years." Kirk can see it, Nogura's ancient body broken among rocks, blood draining from every orifice. It's just as vivid as the presumably real medical equipment in the room. Despite his best efforts, his fingers have dimpled the apple -- he concentrates on the barely detectable scent.

McCoy's eyebrows lift. "You don't think I'm capable?" And then his lips curl into a cold smile. "But no, I won't get the credit. I won't even be associated with what happens."

"How?"

"Why should I trust you with the details? Right now, you could tell someone that I made this claim, but you have no proof. And I would know, and nothing would happen to Nogura for months, or years -- long enough for your report to be forgotten. And then when he went down, you would find yourself dragged along with him." The sun-yellow eyes shine with conviction, promises of destruction in the clawed fingers that curl above Nogura's desecrated corpse. A fly crawls across the admiral's lips.

"I _want_ to see him destroyed." He forgets himself, and nods towards the apparition.

"What are you seeing, right now?" McCoy says softly, frowning.

Kirk closes his eyes. "Nothing."

Pain lashes across his cheek. "Never lie to me." Kirk stares at McCoy in shock, the lines of reality blurring. He can't tell whether it was just a slap, or if the claws have actually left bloody furrows on his face. "I'm sure that's the sort of clever semantic trick your mother was amused by. I don't find it the slightest bit charming.

"Now _focus_. You and I are the only people in this room, and it is a hospital room. Nothing more."

"I see the hospital room. And lots of other things that I'm well aware can't be here. Does it matter what they are?"

McCoy makes an exasperated noise. "Lie back."

Kirk eases himself cautiously back down on the bed, rubs the back of his hand across his sore cheek. His skin comes away clean. The doctor's attention is focused on the bed's readouts, as if Kirk's tangled brain can be understood that way, and the Southern drawl he keeps carefully under wraps slips away from him. "Gonna need a goddamned neurologist to make sense of this."

"Would you really like me better if I made sense?" Kirk smiles cynically. "I just live in a very strange universe compared to yours."

"Yes, but I need you to be able to _function_ in this one."

"I function all the time when I'm hallucinating. And you had no idea that I was anyway." He's looking up into the depthless sky. "I _was _actually sane once."

"Before Tarsus, or before Nogura?"

"Before either. Before they forced me off my ship." A tremor runs through him. McCoy takes the apple from his hand, sets it on the bed next to him.

"_Your_ ship?"

"The _Yorktown_. I grew up there. It was my home."

"I see." McCoy runs a thumb across his lower lip, maybe considering for the first time what it might be like to be raised by Winona Kirk in a battleship between the stars. She'd fought fiercely to keep her sons with her, but it only worked while they were young and harmless, and George Kirk's reflected glory was still fresh. Challenging, inquisitive preteens had turned out to be a lot less tolerable on a starship.

"Starfleet threw me off onto filthy dying Tarsus, then scrambled to claim me back after I proved how 'brilliant' I was by surviving the hellhole." His voice is taut with scorn and rage, fists achingly tight. "And just my luck to get 'rescued' by the _Kongo_, so I get handed up the ladder to fucking _Nogura_, who only gives a damn about having perfectly obedient little blond boys kiss his boots in exactly the perfect way, who thinks you have to break someone down before they can serve, who doesn't give a _fuck_ what he's breaking...." Swirling blood and monsters dissolve into each other around the steady white walls of the room.

McCoy is watching him closely. "If I have my way, one day men like Nogura won't be protected by their connections." He pauses. "Leash the anger, Kirk. It's useful, but it won't do you any good here. And if you lose it with me, I guarantee you'll never make it back into space. Take a breath."

Kirk sucks a deep angry breath in and exhales harshly, tries again more slowly.

"That's good. Again."

He glares at McCoy, but follows his lead in getting a handle on his breathing. The chaos retreats a little bit.

"Good. So. Do we have a deal?"

"Yes." To see Nogura dead? To be taken seriously? To get a grip on his ever-shifting world? Kirk will do anything.

McCoy nods, and draws the wheeled table back over to the bed. He lifts the empty meal tray off to the side table, sets the apple back where it belongs, pulls the chessboard from somewhere and starts setting it up.

Kirk laughs and sits forward in the bed, ready to play.


End file.
